Hybrid IT is top priority for businesses in 2017

IT leaders today are challenged to deploy technologies within the organisation.

This vendor-written piece has been edited by Executive Networks Media to eliminate product promotion, but readers should note it will likely favour the submitter's approach.

Tan Kit Yong, Regional Director, Southeast Asia, CenturyLink

Successful IT mandates aligning of technology to business requirements. IT leaders today are challenged to employ digital technologies coupled with organisation, operational and business model innovation to create new ways to operate and grow. 2016 has been the year where almost every company evolved into a tech company.

In 2017, we will continue to see these macro trends at top of mind - digital transformation, hybrid IT and security, but they are not to be considered in isolation. Managed security influences the uptake of hybrid IT models and both factors impact the enterprises digital transformation journey. The following are key tech predictions we'll see in Southeast Asia.

1. Digital transformation - Enterprises are moving from the awareness stage to the adoption stage when it comes to digital transformation. They are embarking on their IT transformation journey and starting to adopt and adapt to digital disruption.

Organisations are looking for a manage service provider with the right credentials who provides secure services that meet KPIs when it comes to pricing, performance, availability and service delivery.

2. Hybrid IT - This model is fast becoming the IT infrastructure of choice across organisations in Southeast Asia as they move steadily towards using a blend of in-house and third-party hybrid IT services for data centre, security, and application services. It is the pervasive IT infrastructure model for organisations in Southeast Asia too.

Hybrid IT provides IT services for organisations while enabling risk mitigation (appealing to security conscious executives), and requires strategic alignment between internal and external IT professionals to support business objectives.

Organisations increasingly want customisation of services to meet their varying needs. For instance, if an organisation needed hosted infrastructure, or data centres, they want one provider who is able to offer that. Hybrid IT also provides the much-needed scalability, flexibility and agility. The ability to scale services over time as required means the organisation only pays for what is needed.

Hybrid IT will continue to grow as businesses outsource services and connect them with existing infrastructure. It will continue to drive agility, modernise the IT environment, and maintain competitiveness without over-commitment to CAPEX costs.

3. Cloud - Cloud is no longer a discussion of the future. Everyone has either already moved to the cloud, or are thinking of it.

2017 will see large scale migration to cloud-based platforms, particularly as managed service providers can help reduce the challenges in the cloud for businesses. We will also see an explosive growth of cloud-based security-as-a-service offerings.

An increasingly common approach is a "Cloud First" strategy to new deployments and projects. Some organisations are not fully prepared to go with a complete cloud solution across their environment. Instead, they seek to combine legacy systems not yet ready for updating, together with cloud-based services such as analytics, collaboration and communication.